Insightful tongues warn of the dangers of letting high and mighty words get in the way of the message when writing about God. Glad those aren’t the kind in my writings. I would be aghast and discomposed to exorbitant proportions were it so. Now I love words, as the previous sentence may suggest. But I love God more. So how do I convey the love I feel for each without getting in the way myself? I have no clear answer.
Discursive blandishments are a distraction. I think we can all agree on that. But I can’t help myself; nor do I want to. Words dance about my head like a gardenful of butterflies. They’re just too beautiful not to take in. Inwardly, I revel in a swarm of shapely words, grateful for the inherent beauty of every colorful one, and compelled to find, and even more to feel, their exclusive connection to proclaiming a mighty God. I hope not to reform.
“He has risen!” (Luke 24:6b) Simple enough words. Proving, too, that life-changing words don’t need to be expansive. But then, so many more come to mind. So many and wonderful, in fact, that I want to have every one of them bound straight from my heart. But alas, in writing, I must choose. Therefore, I’m afraid my medium is a bottleneck of sorts, certainly so when it comes to making way for the greatness of the subject—God’s infinite love—to shine all the way through. Even if I could write of God for a thousand years, using all available words, at best how could it be otherwise than as through a prism, where light’s constituent parts change direction and shine forth in unexpected ways? His glory cannot be captured by mortal words, be they simple or not; it can only be refracted. Nor can any medium we ever fashion capture God’s glory. Thankfully, they’re not supposed to. For He has captured us.
And thus, in the end, we find that our message is the medium. It is the spark within, where God inspires us through limitless imagination and draws us to Himself through our words, our sounds, our creations. He excites all available expression to “Shout joyfully to the Lord,” (Psalm 98:4a) and we all get to play a part of His choosing. As for me, to exalt my Lord through unrestrained and expressive verbiage is the inexorable odyssey of my heart. In other words, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
I hope this encourages you to express your love for God today.
-Kevin Murray
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